On Wed, 7 Feb 2007, Richard wrote:
Any ideas on how I would go about putting this humpty
dumpty back
together again?
Its a Visual 500 terminal, and its significant because
a) in two years of monitoring ebay I haven't seen any other
Visual Technology terminals offered
b) it has graphics capability (Tektronix 4010 emulation)
This thing was so poorly packed that even the spacing
posts in the
keyboard were sheared off. The circuit boards don't appear damaged
and amazingly the tube doesn't appear damaged, but obviously the case
is pretty heavily smashed. The ebay seller accused me of trying to
rip them off by claiming damage and then made a big stink about me
giving them negative feedback. I think there was *one* inflated
pillow style spacer on the top of the unit when I opened it. They
also tried to claim that UPS packed it, which seems like utter
bullshit.
I've been thinking that I might be able to glue enough of the pieces
of the case back together to get something stable enough to have the
electronics working again. (I've never attempted to power it on and
man, was I pissed when I opened up this box!)
Been there, done that.
You might be able to find some of my old posts in the classiccmp archives
regarding different chemicals for plastic repair/welding.
I'd suggest you try something like Proweld from Ambroid.
http://www.ambroid.com/Ambroid.html
Its primarily methylene chloride (dichloromethane) and seems to work great
for ABS plastics used in older cases and parts. The newer ABS+PC
(polycarbonate) blends won't bond together very well though.
-Toth